Cantata for August
signed and dated 1976 (lower left) and titled (in verso)
oil on canvas
32” x 24” (81 cm x 61 cm)

HR Ocampo would use blue and black very rarely. The years before his death, however, saw these banished colors appearing in his works, including white, the stark white of the canvas. Yellow was still the constant but “intimations of mortality” on the part of the artist had not only changed his vision but his color scheme as well.

Being one of his works in his twilight years, “Cantata for August” also represents the final maturation of the abstract style of the artist in painting the search of the Filipino spirit.

He died a few days after Christmas, 1978. But H.R. Ocampo left more than enough paintings in celebration of life, both surgingand resurgent, nascent and renascent, reflective of the immortal spirit of his art.